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Initially, Israel's aerial attack on the Hamas militant negotiating team in Qatar appeared like another escalation that pushed the prospect of a ceasefire further away.

This strike on September 9 violated the sovereignty of an US partner and threatened expanding the hostilities into a region-wide war.

Negotiations seemed to be in ruins.

Instead, it turned out to be a pivotal event that has led in a agreement, declared by Donald Trump, to release all remaining hostages.

This is a goal that Trump, and Joe Biden before him, had sought for nearly two years.

It is just the initial phase towards a more durable peace, and the details of disarming Hamas, administering Gaza and full Israeli withdrawal remain to be worked out.

Yet if this agreement holds, it could be Trump's defining accomplishment of his second term - one that escaped Joe Biden and his administration.

Trump's distinct approach and crucial relationships with Israel and the Arab world appear to have contributed in this breakthrough.

But, as with many diplomatic achievements, there were also factors involved beyond the control of both leaders.

A Close Relationship Which Eluded Biden

Publicly, Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are consistently friendly.

The president likes to say that Israel has no greater ally, and Netanyahu has called him as the country's "greatest ever ally in the White House". And these positive statements have been backed up by deeds.

Throughout his first presidential term, the president moved the US embassy in Israel from its former location to Jerusalem and discarded a long-held US position that Israeli settlements in the Palestinian West Bank are illegal, the position under global norms.

After the Israeli military began its bombing campaign against the Islamic Republic in the summer, Trump directed US bombers to strike the nation's atomic sites with its most powerful conventional bombs.

Those visible shows of backing may have allowed the president the leeway to apply more influence on Israel in private. According to reports, Trump's negotiator, his representative, browbeat the prime minister in the latter part of the year into agreeing to a halt in fighting in exchange for the freeing of some hostages.

When Israeli forces launched strikes against Syria's military in July, even bombing a place of worship, the US president pressured Netanyahu to change course.

Trump exhibited a degree of determination and pressure on an Israeli prime minister that is virtually unprecedented, according to Aaron David Miller of the a think tank. "There is no example of an American president directly instructing an Israeli prime minister that they must agree or else."

Joe Biden's connection with the Israeli administration was consistently more strained.

His administration's "bear hug approach" argued that the United States had to support Israel openly in order to allow it to influence the nation's war conduct behind closed doors.

Beneath this was the president's nearly half-century of support for the state, as well as deep disagreements within his political base over the conflict in Gaza. Each move the leader took endangered fracturing his own domestic support, whereas Trump's solid Republican base gave him more flexibility to manoeuvre.

Ultimately, domestic politics or individual ties may have had less importance than the simple fact that, throughout Biden's presidency, Israel was not ready to reach an agreement.

Several months into Trump's second term, with Iran weakened, the militant group to its immediate north greatly diminished and the coastal strip in ruins, every one of its key military goals had been achieved.

Business History Assisted Secure Gulf's Backing

An Israeli strike in Doha, which killed a Qatari citizen but not the intended targets, led the president to issue an ultimatum to the prime minister. The war had to stop.

The US leader had given the Israeli military a relatively free hand in the territory. He provided American military might to Israel's campaign in the neighboring country. However an attack on Qatar soil was a different matter completely, pushing him closer to the stance of Arab nations on how best to conclude the conflict.

Several administration figures have informed media outlets that this was a decisive moment which galvanised the leader to apply full force to finalize an agreement.

This US president's strong connections with the Arab monarchies are widely known. Trump has business dealings with Qatar and the United Arab Emirates. He began both his presidential terms with official trips to Saudi Arabia. This year, Trump also visited in Doha and Abu Dhabi.

The president's normalization agreements, which established ties between the Jewish state and a number of Arab nations, such as the UAE, was the most significant diplomatic achievement of his initial presidency.

The time devoted in the capitals of the Gulf region earlier this year helped change his thinking, says Ed Husain of the a policy institute. Trump did not travel to the country on this Middle East trip but visited the United Arab Emirates, the kingdom and the state where he received consistent appeals to put a stop to the conflict.

Within weeks after that Israeli strike on the city, Trump sat close as Netanyahu personally called the Qatari leadership to express regret. Subsequently, the Israeli leader gave approval on Trump's comprehensive proposal for Gaza - one that also had the backing of influential Arab states in the area.

If Trump's relationship with his counterpart provided him the room to influence Israel to reach an agreement, his past with Muslim leaders may have secured their support, and helped them convince Hamas to agree to the deal.

"One of the things that evidently occurred was that President Trump gained leverage with the Israelis, and indirectly with the militants," says Jon Alterman of the a research center.

"That made a difference. The capacity to achieve this on his own schedule, and not succumb to the desires of the combatants has been a challenge that many earlier administrations have struggled with, and he seems to handle relatively successfully."

The reality that the president is much more popular in the nation than Netanyahu personally was leverage that he employed to his advantage, he adds.

Currently the Israeli government has agreed to releasing over a thousand detainees held in Israeli prisons and has consented to a limited pullback from the strip.

Hamas will release all the captives still held, living and dead, taken during the original 7 October assault, which resulted in the death of over 1,200 Israelis.

An end to the war, which has led to the destruction of Gaza and the fatalities of over 67,000 {Palestinians|Pal